Hierome would spend nearly all his life in Staunton. He first enlisted in the Staunton Rifles a company of the 70th Regiment of the Virginia Volunteer Infantry in 1899 as a PVT. As such he participated in the unit's service in civil action in the Richmond street car strike of 1903. He founded the Evening Leader newspaper in 1904. Hierome was first commissioned as a 2LT on 13 Jun 1905 and promoted to CPT on 4 Jun 1906.
Hierome married Mary Eleanor Ranson on 28 Sep 1910. Her father was a prominent local lawyer. The couple would have 4 children of whom the 3rd would die in infancy.
He commanded the Staunton unit then known as I Company 1st Virginia Infantry and in 1916 took the company to service on the Mexican border. Mobilizing with the unit for the war in France, he at first commanded the newly formed A Company 116th Infantry Regiment He was promoted to MAJ on 5 Mar 1918 and assumed command of the 3rd Battalion of the 116th Infantry Regiment. He departed with that unit for France aboard the USS Finland in June 1918. While in France he was wounded on 15 Oct 1918 and was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for refusing to be evacuated but continuing to lead his battalion taking the unit objective and consolidating its position. He spent several months recovering from his wounds before he was assigned the command of 1st Battalion 113th Infantry Regiment and returned with that unit aboard the USS Floridian in May 1919.
After returning from France in May 1919, Hierome purchased the Staunton Daily News in that same year and combined the 2 newspapers into the Staunton News-Leader which is still published today. He was active in establishing the American Legion in Staunton and in supporting the needs of returning soldiers. When the regiment was re-organized as a National Guard unit in 1921, then LTC Opie was convinced to take command of the 116th to be headquartered in Staunton. He worked to make it one of the finest regiments in the National Guard. Despite having a health scare in 1926, he recovered enough to continue in command of the 116th until 1933. COL Opie led the unit in aiding civil authorities in the Danville Mill Strike in 1931 until the unit was relieved. He was also a founder of the Staunton Chamber of Commerce of which he was president for 12 years. Hierome was on the original committee that started the Shenandoah National Park movement. He was a vestryman in the Trinity Episcopal Church. He wrote articles about conservation and wildlife.
Additionally he was a member of the National Press Club, Sons of the American Revolution, Commonwealth Club of Richmond, the Army and Navy Legion of Honor, the New York Southern Society, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the Virginia Academy of Science, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Also, he was a member of Staunton Masonic Lodge No. 13, Staunton-Augusta post Veterans of Foreign Wars, Clemmer-McGuffin post of the American Legion, the Woodrow Wilson post of the 29th Division Association (now Post 116), a charter member of the Staunton Rotary Club, and on the board of directors of the Staunton Industrial Loan Corporation.
A marksman, he not only promoted marksmanship in his military units, he participated and was on the Virginia team at the national matches at Seagirt, New Jersey in 1906 and at Camp Perry in 1909, 1910, 1911 and 1913.
Hierome was ill and did not leave home for 22 days before he died on 26 Feb 1943. He was buried in Thornrose Cemetery in Staunton, Virginia in a ceremony attended by U.S. Senator Harry Flood Byrd and Virginia Governor Colgate Darden.
He was the brother of MG Evarts Walton Opie. His oldest son LTC (USMC Ret) Hierome Lindsay Opie Jr. served with the USMC 1st Division in the south Pacific in WW2 . His youngest son CPT Thomas Ranson Opie, was killed with 15 others when he B29 Superfortress crashed in a training flight near Clovis, New Mexico.
Note: This memorial was published on the 50th anniversary of his death.
